Chapter 42: The Hearthome Battle Tournament Begins!
Brief Summary As they wait for the start of the Hearthome Battle Tournament, the group decides to explore the Hearthome Summer Festival. Dressed in traditional robes, Sam, Alyssandra, Pikachu, Jeremy and Niya go and see what the matsuri has to offer. Splitting off into two groups, Sam and Alyssandra go and explore the festival's games and food, and Sam wins Alyssandra a Mew doll. While travelling through the streets to meet back up with the others, the two happen upon a mask selling stall run by the Happy Mask Salesman. After an odd encounter with the man and his very valuable mask, Sam and Alyssandra are granted two masks as a gift. Afterwards they meet up with Jeremy and Niya, switching their festival partners as the girls go off to see the dancing Kimono Girls from the Johto Region and Sam and Jeremy go off to compete against each other at carnival games. The group meets up once more at four in the afternoon, and go towards the Hearthome Cathedral in order to hear Eliza and Cynthia give the opening speech of the Hearthome City Battle Tournament. After Eliza introduces herself and Cynthia, the latter takes all of the contestants down to an underground hall, once used as a weapons and supplies storehouse by the former ruler of Hearthome City, hundreds of years before. While waiting down there for their numbers to be called, in order to compete in the preliminary rounds, the group is introduced to Cynthia, who soon explains, in short, her past as Professor Rowan's student and Palmer's lifelong friend. Cynthia also spoke of how she became League Champion of Sinnoh by defeating Jeremy's grandmother, the champion before her, Adelaida De Oliveira. Not long after, the group was sent out to battle against their opponents. After a few hours of waiting, the group is finally called up to fight their opponents. Sam is paired off with the reigning champion of the Tournament, Luxray Girl. The two clash, with Luxray Girl using her namesake Pokemon, a Luxray up against Sam's first pick, Cranidos, and though his Cranidos held its own against Luxray, even seemingly slipping it up with an Ice Beam, it was easily defeated by the enemy Luxray. Sam then sent out his Gible, hoping to gain an advantage against Luxray with a Ground Type Pokemon. Though Gible managed to hold its own as well, even evolving into a Gabite, Sam realized that he would have no chance of defeating Luxray or its Trainer, as Luxray was able to take strong hits and walk away as if nothing happened. Sam then forfeited his match, and returned to the group. As the chapter draws to a close, the group is sitting in the Pokemon Center, enjoying a dinner, their Pokemon resting up after everyone's losses that day. While they're eating, Eliza arrives to check up on her sister and the latter's friends before they leave the next day. At that time, Sam confronts Eliza, revealing that he is aware she is Luxray Girl, and that he understood she was trying to teach him a lesson, which was why Sam forfeited so easily. Eliza applauds him for recognizing her plan, and for accepting the lesson so easily and then departs as Sam returns to dinner with his friends. Characters Here is a list of characters and Pokemon from the chapter by order of appearance: Characters *Niya Konstantinova *Jeremy De Oliveira Malhotra *Alyssandra De Rossi *Sam Accardi *Happy Mask Salesman *Eliza De Rossi *Cynthia *Aurelio Giovinazzo Pokemon *Jeremy's Pikachu *Sam's Cranidos *Sam's Gabite Locations Here is a list of locations from the chapter by order of appearance: *Pokemon Center (Hearthome City) *Hearthome City *Hearthome Cathedral External Links *Read Pokemon Heroes: Sinnoh Saga online here Category:Chapters (Sinnoh Saga) Category:Chapters